Zohran probably can’t get through the Working Class Wall

Why a neighborhood-level analysis of the Mayor's race gives Cuomo the advantage

As the New York Democratic primary races to a conclusion, the polls have shown a narrow but consistent advantage for Andrew Cuomo over his main rival, the socialist Zohran Mamdani. Looking at the political geography of the city, it’s easy to understand why. There are simply more places for Cuomo to run up the score with his voters than for Mamdani with his. Even with the recent leftward and cosmopolitan shift in the Democratic Party’s base, there is still a Working Class Wall in New York City’s Democratic primary electorate that will prove tough to penetrate for a progressive candidate like Mamdani.

I’ve created 13 custom political geographies for New York City that can help us understand the dynamics heading into the primary tomorrow. The city is possibly the one place in the country best suited for this sort of analysis, given its high levels of diversity and the need for forge coalitions across different neighborhood types. Borough-level and even Assembly District-level analysis may fall short, since these units may span multiple different political communities, each of which vote very differently.

Using Colin Miller’s Redistricter, I’ve built these micro-communities from the precinct level on up. I’ll acknowledge some limitations: 2024 presidential and past primary data isn’t loaded into the dataset, though the 2022 governor’s race is a fair approximation of the current state of the party’s bases, with the Democrats doing worse than 2024 in The Bronx and Kathy Hochul worse in Queens. Throughout this piece, I’ve used Hochul’s 2022 totals as an estimate of Democratic voting strength in each of the neighborhoods.